


Sleep Ain't No Walk In The Park

by Ididntsignupforthisshit (myhamartia)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Asexual Character, Asexual! Lance, Background but heavily involved Shatt, Bisexual Keith, Fluff, Gay Lance, Keith and Shiro are Siblings, Klance Big Bang 2017, M/M, insomniac!Lance, radio DJ!Keith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-08
Updated: 2017-11-08
Packaged: 2019-01-31 03:16:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12667122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myhamartia/pseuds/Ididntsignupforthisshit
Summary: Lance sleeps like a baby. And no, not in the way that phrase tries to frame infants.He tosses, he turns, he nearly cries out of sheer exhaustion.He’s an insomniac, has been for a long time. He’s tried all of the tips and tricks, but nothing works for him.That is, until his friend Pidge shared the college radio station with him. There was a host that came on the air every night, giving some kind of strange talk show. He was blunt with his words, and maybe a little crazy with his late night conspiracy theories. Lance didn’t really care about the show’s content though, try as he might.Deep down, all he really cared about was the host’s, Park’s voice. It was all of the best things. All of the things that made Lance shiver. It was relaxing. Lance couldn’t even explain the full effect Park’s voice had on him, but really only one thing matteredEvery night, as Lance listened in to DJ Park’s show, he found himself sleeping the entire night, like a baby. Just like the phrase says.





	Sleep Ain't No Walk In The Park

         It was nice, his voice. It had this calming effect on Lance he never really wanted to dwell on; it warmed him from the inside-out, gave him warm butterflies that were pretty content to just chill in his stomach, making a mess of his emotions.

    With a breath and a private little smile, he snuggled deeper into his pillow. His eyes slipped shut as he listened to the soft baritone droning in his his earbuds.

    In all honesty, Lance didn’t even know what the radio show was about that night. It was some well-versed topic playing on the station, but that didn’t matter in the long run. Lance used to pay attention to the topic, but as he always ended up drifting off within minutes, he had quickly learned to just lay back and relax, listening to the soothing voice and letting it lull him to sleep.

    Frankly, the station could be talking about constant conspiracy theories 24/7 and Lance would have a total of zero objections.

    He just needed to hear _that voice_.

    See, the truth was: Lance has always been terrible at falling asleep. Just damn terrible at it. His brain was always too active, buzzing with project ideas, recapping social interactions and class lectures in his mind’s eye or simply just plain _thinking_. Point was: Lance could never just lie still with his eyes closed and expect to fall asleep in seventeen minutes or whatever the quack scientist’s number was. He’s always been up in the dark or resting in patchy - very patchy - fits of sleep. He’s left to fend for himself with daytime cat naps between classes and the energy drinks he wastes his paychecks on.

    It was different with _Voltron_ , the college’s radio station. There was a DJ that came on around midnight; going by the name DJ Park. It wasn’t the most creative stage name, but hey, Lance could look past that in the name of sweet, sweet sleep. Speaking of sleep, Lance had no doubts that the DJ gets very little of it, himself, seeing as Park’s shift ran from midnight to three in the morning. He ran a talk show that turned out to be fairly popular among Lance’s fellow insomniac brethren around campus.

    The show’s content was all over the place sometimes, ranging from discussing how Michelangelo's David was made purely with the Power of Spite to how the poppies growing at Park’s grandma’s were doing (and very helpful gardening tips for the green thumbed crowd) to all the latest campus drama running around. Sometimes, all in the same night. It was weird for Lance to listen to it all at first, taking in the topics like a Serious listener and trying to discover how it matched up with last night’s episode in terms of relatability, but eventually he was able to let loose and stop questioning it all so hard.

    It took a while to admit that DJ Park’s voice was helping his sleep schedule. Lance called it a fluke that the night that he first listened to him via a recommendation (see: command) given by Lance’s friend, Pidge. “It helps me sleep sometimes,” she had told him. “Don’t give me that look, I know you’re exhausted as all hell. Your concealer is applied nicely, but listen man, I know sleep deprivation when I see it. _I._ _Know_.”

    So Lance tried it. He tried it and _yes, alright_ , the guy’s voice is pretty fantastically relaxing, all slow and melodic and just right. It had Lance melting into his mattress, rolling his shoulders to let the tension loose from them. He got a good night’s rest that night - almost good enough to deal with Pidge’s excited “You listened to it, didn’t you? Ha! I told you! He’s magic. He’s like the Sandman or something.”

    Thanks to DJ Park, Lance hadn’t had a troubled night as long as his internet connection was decent and the stream was fair.

    So, yeah, he needed the radio show. At least for the sake of his concealer supply. You don’t want to know how much he poured into keeping those designer eye bags under wraps. That’s his careful secret, thanks.

    “Anyhow, the cafeteria’s idea of a Waffle Thursday make no sense. It’s so ridiculous. Why not have it on a Wednesday like a normal function? It makes so much more sense, it’s appealing and it’s just an overall _good plan_. Better than fuckin’ Waffle Thursday. God, who thought that up?”

    Lance hummed and moved his head a little as to adjust the angle of the earbud digging into his ear painfully. That did sound ridiculous, he granted Park. Pretty…. Damn… ridicu-

    And like a light, Lance was out.

    After sleeping like a baby, or a lion, or a baby lion, Lance felt great. He was energetic when he awoke, took great notes in class and was a general joy to be around(in his opinion, anyhow).

    The day went great. Just as possibly great as it could get - or, at least until he met up with Pidge and Hunk in the quad. With a blanket under them, they stretched comfortably out in the perfect summer-just-turned-autumn weather. Pidge had a book in her hand, lying on her back, holding the book open above her face. Hunk was to the side of Lance, scribbling in a notebook, just some mathematical equations Lance wasn’t particularly keen on getting into. Lance himself was lying on his side with his face practically pressed to Hunk’s thigh as his fingers fussed with a loose thread on the seam of his jeans. He looked at the little weave of denim, traced his fingers in the fabric and periodically pulled at the loose thread. He was careful not to disturb his best friend’s work, just simply enjoyed the warmth of him under his fingers and vaguely against the side of his cheek.

    Just Lance and his buds, enjoying the weather on a blanket. It was then that Pidge suddenly dropped her book on her face as she jolted suddenly with an important fragment of information that had to be shared right at that moment. She scrambled to sit up, a repetitive “oh, oh, oh,” leaving her lips as if she hadn’t already caught the attention of the two men with her.

    “Lance,” she said almost maniacally. “Did you hear about Park’s slot shutting down?”

    Lance was next to sit up, eyes widening totally un-comically - because that was fucking serious, dammit!

    “What do you mean shutting down!?” he demanded, reaching out to grab her knee, rising to his knees as he did so.

    She shook her head in an apologetic manner. “No, not shutting down. Sorry, I meant the night time business is shutting down. They’re moving him to the morning show. I heard it’s because his weekly reviews were so much better than pretty much everybody’s. People barely listen to the campus radio, except for him. So they moved him up to the morning shift.”

    Lance blanched, taking his hand away from Pidge like she had offended him on all the levels she ever could in all of twenty seconds.

    “I- but he-, I-!” He stopped short, a deep frown taking over his face as he thought about the prospects of what was to come: weeks upon weeks of sleepless nights, nights lying awake as he stared at the ceiling and waited for unconsciousness to overtake him. He laid back down numbly. There was only one question in Lance’s mind and it was by far the most important. “How am I gonna sleep?”

         Turns out, nature, or Lance’s body, the People Upstairs, or quite possibly God Himself just decided that Lance _definitely_ should not sleep again. Ever. He was doomed to a life of rolling over, fluffing out his pillow and breathing curses out into his dorm room. His laptop was no help in luring him to sleep. He had hoped that maybe he could work on a couple of essays until his eyes began to droop - but even that hadn’t worked.

    Neither had pulling up the college radio’s webpage, desperately searching up the stream button. Turns out they had given the position to a person who _really_ liked to play weird sounding opera in the middle of the night. Lance suspected it was the only thing keeping the British-sounding person awake in the middle of the night, but he wasn’t going to go hunt down the person to confirm anything.

    He was really surprised that there wasn’t any sound clips floating around the page about Park - whether it be a radio session or just a little thing to say “Oh hey! You might like to listen to this guy; you should check him out!” It was around the fifth time checking the stream just to make sure Park didn’t burst in and take over that Lance realized that he was in more than a little bit of trouble. Park was gone, and by consequence, so were Lance’s restful nights.

         And this was how Lance’s days went after that: Exhaustion-wracked and snippy. He was always on a short fuse, blowing up at the littlest of things. Hunk and Pidge understood, sure, but that didn’t stop the reproachful looks that were cast his way after an aggravated comment came out of his mouth, biting and sharp.

    “Go take a nap and unbunch your panties,” Pidge snapped at him after the first week. They were in study group then. She left promptly afterwards, practically fuming.

    Lance realized that he was lashing out illogically, but he was just _so tired_ and, sue him, but he didn’t know how to deal.

    And even though, _technically_ , Lance still had the chance to nap while listening to DJ Park, it was rare that he ever had a show where Lance wasn’t in class. He hadn’t figured out how to record it so he could save it to listen to at night, so that was a miss as well.

    Cat naps weren’t enough and he knew his classes were suffering, as he was never focused enough to take the proper notes. Apples and green tea weren’t doing shite and all he was left with was sticky fingers and a so called “energizing snack” that did diddly squat.

    That led him to his current position in Hunk’s arms, eyes closed and lips thinned in determination. Cuddling was his last resort, and he had to admit that the warmth of his friend was already relaxing him a bit.

    They were in Hunk’s dorm, cuddled together in the dim room. They were facing each other, with Lance’s head cushioned on Hunk’s upper arm and his arm thrown over the larger man’s stomach; their legs were entangled together. Hunk held a book above Lance’s head and the only constant sound, save their breathing, was the sound of the pages turning. It was comforting and Lance was certainly enjoying the sleepy moment; Hunk’s belly and how it felt at he inhaled and exhaled against Lance pressed into his side was nice, as was Hunk’s faint breath in his hair. His warmth was a plus and Lance felt insanely safe and comfortable in Hunk’s arms.

But not sleepy - which was the whole idea of this particular cuddle session.

    He made an unhappy noise against Hunk’s chest and Hunk shifted, tucking his chin so he could look at Lance.

    “I thought you had drifted off,” he confessed. “You got really still for a while.”

    “You’re comfy,” Lance hums. “But nope, no sleep has been accomplished. Zip, nada, nil.” He sighed and let his head fall back a little so he could look at Hunk’s face a little better. “I gotta get him back.”

    Hunk breathed out a little laugh. He moved so that he could stick his bookmark in place, tightening his hold on Lance momentarily before he shut his book and tossed it to lay somewhere among the sheets. “You make it sound like he’s your ex, you know that, right?”

    Lance made a desperate sound. “I’m starting to _feel_ like he’s my ex.” He rubbed his cheek against Hunk’s arm like it would scrub away the little blotchy stain of color coming up his cheeks. “I mean, I’m losing sleep over this guy, Hunk! Literally! I gotta do something about it.” He lifted his eyes up until blue met brown. “I’m about to go and _pay_ him to switch back to the night shift.”

    “Mm, maybe if you do you’ll quit taking all my apples for an in-class snack.” Hunk’s pointed accusation was accompanied by a little side-eyed squint down to Lance.

    Lance winced. “Yeaaah, I’ve been meaning to pay you back for those.”

    “Don’t worry about it, man.” Hunk shifted a little, settling back down into his pillow, getting comfortable. He cracked one brown eye open to watch as Lance mirrored his movements. “But seriously, you ought to go down to where they record it all. Maybe you can convince them to start recording Park’s episodes and put them up for download on the website. There’s gotta be more people than just you who would like that getting done.”

    Lance took that into consideration as his eyes slipped shut. “Yeah, I guess it wouldn’t hurt to try it.” Hunk made a sound of agreement and tucked Lance’s head into his neck via a prod with his chin. A nap was, in fact. achieved that day, and Lance woke up feeling energized again (of course, this was after the typical post-nap grogginess).

         He decided that it was time to try Hunk's suggestion out. Or at least, he told himself that he was going to try. He found himself pulling open the glass doors to the tiny building after an astrophysics class the next day, his backpack still firmly over his shoulder. He marched right up to the front desk, where a dark-haired person sat, looking down at their phone with disinterest as they ignored the slew of papers in front of them. Lance came up to the desk, expecting them to look up at him, but got nothing.

    Lance examined the person in front of him, from the unbuttoned red plaid overshirt to the dark skinny jeans on their crossed legs, to the little pronoun pin perched on the white undershirt they wore. The little button held the message “He/Him” in blocky letters on a black background. He barely noticed the earbuds perched in his ears until he found himself staring at the little stud earring in his right ear.

    “Oh,” he mused to himself before he tapped at the edge of the counter closest to the young man. He blinked when he noticed Lance’s tapping and he slowly looked up, frowning. He rubbed his ear against his shoulder, effectively popping the earbud out, leaving his head slightly tilted to the side in an inquisitive look. The light caught his cheekbones and the gentle slope of his nose and Lance had to catch his breath for a split second because _damn_. This guy was cute.

    Obviously, that split second stretched on a bit too long for this guy because he cleared his throat impatiently. “Um… can I help you?” he asked, obviously bored with this current moment in life. His voice sounded vaguely familiar, but Lance chalked it up to maybe sharing a class with him before.

    Lance’s face lit up with a crooked smile. “Wassup my guy?” he greeted easily. “Name’s Lance.” He offered out his hand, but the young man didn’t take it. Slowly, a bit awkwardly, Lance took the hand back to hook his thumb into a belt loop around the back of his pants. “I was wondering if I could talk to the guy in charge of programming.”

    The man frowned slightly. “Why?” he asked, incredulous. “You do know that all advertisement spots, job information and contact info is on the website, don’t you?” He let his iPhone slip out of his fingers to thump onto the countertop.

    “Yeah, no, yeah, I know that. I’m not looking for a job or to put up an ad.” He shook his head the negative and adjusted his feet on the coarse carpet he stood on. “It was just about the midnight show that used to be on - Park’s bit, you know?”

    It looked like he had hit a nerve with the man. A wary eyebrow was raised and he appraised Lance with a newly careful eye. “What about it?”

    Lance bit the inside of his cheek, flicking his eyes to the little doorway behind the desk. He didn’t really want to disclose his reason to this man. It was something of a matter of pride, he supposed. Wasn’t it a little pitiful that he needed a reassuring voice to put him to sleep - like a kid asking for a bedtime story from their mother. It was embarrassing and it sent color rising to Lance’s cheeks in uneven blotches. He shrugged a shoulder, trying to feign nonchalance. “It’s, um, not there anymore.”

    “It was moved to one to three in the afternoon.” The man’s voice was _utterly_ unimpressed and it had Lance’s cheeks warming further.

    “Yeah, duh, I know that,” he blubbered lamely, the hand that was on his backpack strap gestured from his forehead to the little distance in the air. He cleared his throat and dropped his hand. “I just wanted to know if any of these shows are recorded as they’re being broadcasted.”

    The man was taken aback with surprise. “Why would you want a recording of _those_ things?” He sounded utterly bewildered.

    Lance shuffled on his feet. “It’s kind of like, a part of my bedtime routine. You know, it gets me relaxed; it helps me sleep better.” _Emmmmmmbarrassing._ Yikes, Lance felt weird standing here, making a request like this. “And… I wanted to know if I could get my hands on any recorded shows you have done.”

    The man’s eyebrows rose critically. “So… you want the records so you can continue jacking off to Park’s voice, right?” The venture was completely off topic and quite frankly made Lance’s stomach give a little disgusted roll.

    “What?” Lance squeaked. “No! Nothing like that!”

    “That’s what it sounds like,” the guy said as-a-matter-of-factly.

    Lance shook his head. “No, look, I’m a sex repulsed ace, okay? That’s not… That’s not a thing I do.” He winced in afterthought as soon as the words left his mouth. Well. Didn’t this outing turn out _just fucking great_ ? Oh. Outing. What a laugh. Lance sighed and ducked his chin. “Hey man, you gotta understand. I’ve got some serious insomnia issues, can’t sleep for anything _unless_ I listen to that radio show. It’s like he’s the fucking Sandman,” he said, stealing the phrase Pidge used when he had first started listening to the show. “Ever since he switched schedules, my nights have been wrecked and my classes are suffering.”

 _Kill me now,_ Lance thought, _maybe then I could at least rest._

    The other took it in stride, nodding in thought. “Even with all that, we don’t record our episodes down. It takes up too much space.” He removed the last earbud from his ear and put it down next to his phone. “Have you ever tried listening to rain soundtracks or something like that? I hear it helps stuff like that.”

    Lance shrugged, leaning against the counter with his forearms folded under him. “No dice. I used to have this little CD that would play the Tarzan soundtrack and that put me out right around _A Wondrous Place_ , but that really doesn’t do anything for me anymore.”

    The guy took that in with a little hum. “Well, there’s nothing I can do.” He shrugged a shoulder.

    Lance scratched at his ear, silently resigning himself as he stepped away from the counter. “Figured as much,” he sighed. “Oh well. I’d better get out of your hair.” He shot the man a finger gun and swung around, hurrying to the glass door.

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** so did u go see the radio station dude?

    Lance looked down to his phone on the tabletop and frowned. He’d been trying to strangle that embarrassment for a full four hours, and yet he’d still had no luck to speak of.

    Sluggishly, he dropped his chin onto his right forearm while the fingers of his left hand typed out a reply.

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** Of course i did

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** all i did was embarrass myself in front of a cute guy after he thought i was jacking off sweetly to DJ Park’s voice everynight

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** bc i made the mistake of saying listening to t was apart of my ‘bedtime routine’

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** Oh my God nooooooooooooo

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** im srry lan i just laughed so hard im negl

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** :((

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** if it makes u feel any better u can come over to our apt any time when u cant sleep and crash in my room

 ** _LimeGreenBaby:_** we can like watch netflix until we both pass out

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** that’s True Friendship tnx Pidgeo

         If Park’s show ever made a comeback, Lance wouldn’t have even noticed.

    He had long since given up on checking every night  and resorted to sulkily spending his nights at the apartment Pidge shared with her older brother, Matt. Some nights, they would share Lance’s dorm room on the occasions when Matt brought his boyfriend home for an evening. They would lie in Lance’s small bed as they debated conspiracy theories and just little things to pass the time.

         That lasted about a week and a half.The sad part was that Lance was adjusting to it.

    They were in Pidge’s living room, with Pidge lying across all three of the couch cushions with Lance on the floor below, rolled up in a fluffy blanket as he stared at the TV screen. A minute by minute documentary about the JFK shooting played, Kevin Spacey’s voice filled the room and Lance found it increasingly hard to pay attention. It just didn’t capture his attention and it left him _bored out of his mind_.

    He unfurled himself from the blanket and got up, stumbling across the floor to the direction of the open kitchen.

    “What’re you doin’?” Pidge slurred, picking her head up off the couch to watch him walk off.

    He yawned and made a gesture for her to lie back down. “I’m getting a snack. Do you want one?” She gave the negative and left Lance to his work. He made a face as she sleepily watched him look through the cabinets. He settled on scrambled eggs, mostly because it was all he wanted to make and he didn’t want a huge clean up. They didn’t take long to make, but apparently it was long enough for Pidge to fully pass out.

    Lance finished up with his eggs and washed out the pan. As he tapped it against the side of the sink, there was a rustling from beyond the living room. A suspicious jiggling of the door knob and the even scarier click of the lock as it gave way to a key. Or a lock pick.

    Matt wasn’t here; he had gone out bowling with his boyfriend and had planned to stay at said boyfriend’s house all night. He had no reason to be coming home.

    Surely, if Lance had been in his right mind, he could have rationalized the idea of Matthew and his boyfriend coming back to Matt’s apartment instead of the boyfriend’s after going bowling, but then again, he _hadn’t been_ in his right mind for over a week. There was an apparent robber right outside the fucking door and there wasn’t time to call the cops, especially since he had left  phone all the way back in Pidge’s room. Quickly, he did what any rational person would do.

    He ninja’d his way into the living room until he stood just inside of the door, clean pan held high above his head, still dripping water. As soon as the door cracked open enough, a battle cry left Lance’s lips and the pan dropped in a downward strike.

    At least it did until it caught against something. A hand. The intruder caught Lance’s only chance of survival like it was a kiddy’s T-ball toss.

    Lance’s voice rang out through the apartment in an ever-elegant “ _OH FUCK_ !” as he tried to pry the pan from the unknown assailant’s hands. A litany of curses emerged from all parties involved; Lance, and not just one person at the door (oh no, he wasn’t so lucky), but at least _two_ , if the multiple voices gave any clues.

    Before Lance knew what the hell was happening, he found himself face-down on the ground with an arm behind his back, being twisted in a way that was sort of _really fucking uncomfortable_.

    “Lance, shut the fuck up! I just fell asleep.” The yell came from the couch and arm was flung into view. When she didn’t follow up, Lance assumed she had fallen back asleep.

    “Lance?” one of the intruders gasped. It wasn’t the one who was holding him down with a knee to his lower back, but it was familiar. “Oh my God; Takashi get off him!”

    The pressure was taken off of his back and he was allowed to breathe.

He still had to pick himself up off of the ground though.

    He muttered another curse as he dragged himself up to stand. He blew out a breath and looked up to Matthew Holt and _the boyfriend_. The hot one that can apparently floor Lance in four seconds flat.

    Fun.

    “I thought you were going back to his place,” Lance said to Matt, nodding his head indicatively to Shiro.

    Matt shrugged. “We were going to come back and watch a movie.” He looked pointedly at the young man. “I thought Katie was staying at yours.”

    “Her bed is more comfortable than mine.” Lance rubbed at his arm.

    The boyfriend shuffled on his feet, looking downward.  Lance wasn’t sure if the look on his face was  embarrassed or apologetic. He held the hand not l holding the frying pan out to Lance, seeming to offer a truce. “I’m sorry about that. Takashi Shirogane. Shiro. I’m Matt’s boyfriend. I work in the campus radio station.”

    Lance looked at it suspiciously for a second before he reached out and shook the man’s hand. “Lance Vasquez.” The words were stiff, but Lance excused himself for it.

    “And you’re… Katie’s boyfriend?” Shiro ventured.

    Well that took Lance a bit aback. He pulled back, making a face that was caught between surprised and flabbergasted.

    “What? No. She’s like, one of my best friends.” Lance shook his head, his face scrunched up distastefully at the very thought.

    Matt intercepted now, concern seeping into his voice. “Why are you still awake?” he asked. “I thought you have class later.”

    Lance fixed him with a dead-ass stare.

    “I’m an insomniac,” Lance said slowly. “I don’t sleep, I just die inside.”

    Matt nodded sympathetically. “That’s okay Lance, nobody’s perfect.” He patted him on the shoulder with a solemn nod.

    Lance simply rolled his eyes and stepped back. “I’ll get out of your way, if you want.” He dug into the carpet with a socked toe. “If y’all’re gonna get jiggy with it, or whatever.”

    “No, that’s not what we came back here for-,” Shiro tried, lifting his hands in a pacifying movement. The pan was still grasped comically in his hand.

    “Nah man, you don’t have to worry about it, I got you. I can clear out.”

    “We only came back to watch a movie,” Matt told him, breaking through to Lance as he began to turn away. “You can stay; we definitely don’t want to kick you out into the night.”

    Lance ended up staying. He ate his plate of eggs and crashed on the couch next to Pidge. He eventually passed out halfway through some animated movie Matt had insisted on. There was a constant quiet commentary shared between the three of them. It was a  little strange, what with the boyfriend and his apparent aversion to jokes - he was so unlike Matt.

    It was around four in the morning before Lance found himself muttering angrily about bottled air and Once-lers before slumping off against Pidge’s side.

         Lance wasn’t too sure what he had triggered by almost (okay, not quite. At all. Hell, he wasn’t even in the same ball park) hitting Shiro in the head with a frying pan, but after that night he had begun to see him more frequently. It happened slowly at first, what with hanging out at Pidge’s more often. Lance, Pidge and Hunk would be studying or simply hanging out when Matt would come home with the man. They would hang around more times than not, fitting nicely in with the group.

    Shiro was a pretty cool dude; he was an astrophysics major, something he and Lance could connect on. He had a sleeve of various tattoos going up his right arm. Pidge had been there for several sessions of getting a good portion of them inked, so she could recount the stories behind most all of them easily. Shiro was smart, cool and the way he handled Pidge and everyone else’s shenanigans gave him a certain dad or big brother vibe. He treated Matt right and was a proper role-model-like figure. So, yeah, in Lance’s book, he was a pretty cool dude.

    And it turned out that he was one of the key factors in running the radio show down on campus. It had been mostly a fun project he had gotten roped into and then he’d stuck with it after the last head graduated, apparently Shiro really enjoyed it. Lance wasn’t really too sure about what he did, exactly, but what he _did_ know was that Shiro was the one who handled most of the programming. Also the one that had made the switch from Park to opera-screamo for the nighttime gig. Lance wasn’t bitter about that (he was), nor did he hint around to Shiro about switching them back (he had. Shiro handled it with a laugh and said that the only real reason they made the switch in the first place was to get said opera-screamo off the morning slot because they were getting too many complaints. It had nothing to do with ratings).

    While the initial switch had not been influenced by ratings, it turned out that Park’s show did much better in the middle of the day. The chances of getting Park switched back to the graveyard shift were basically nil and yes, Lance could admit that he was just a tad bit salty about the whole ordeal. If by a tad bit, you were talking about the damned Dead Sea.

    But it was fine. He could deal. He’d been doing okay so far, after all.

    He did talk to Shiro about recording episodes, though. It was hidden under the guise of being “disappointed about missing the segments nowadays because of class.” Because, really, that’s all Shiro needed to know. And Shiro had said that he’d talk to Park about it; maybe they could rig something up. Suffice to say, Lance was pretty excited at the prospect.

         But the other thing he was pretty excited about was the  long weekend that was fall break. Thursday through Tuesday of pure, stress-free bliss. He had gotten caught up on all of his schoolwork and had since been lazing about in a strange, almost suspicious type of relaxation. He spent the days  lying on Pidge’s couch between Pidge and Hunk, playing video games like none of them had a care in the world. But Lance still had the feeling that he was missing something. Like _something_ was begging to be done. They were in college. College was a time of pressing deadlines and never-ending papers and homework to complete. Exams to study for, deadlines to meet.

It was weird to just get a second where nothing was expected of them and they were left to simply enjoy each other’s company.

    “ _Lance_ , _if you do not get your head out of your ass and shoot the goddamn sentries, I will end your pathetic life._ ”

    If “enjoying each other’s company” meant getting yelled at by Pidge every five seconds because he couldn’t concentrate.

    “Sorry,” Lance yipped, his eyes flicking over the screen as he tried to figure out what sentries Pidge was talking about.

    “All of your blood is trickling to your head,” Hunk advised. “You’d better sit upright; you’re gonna get really dizzy.”

    Lance clicked his tongue, as if that was a ridiculous notion and he wasn’t actually lying upside down with his knees hooked over the back cushions of the couch. Nevertheless, he planted his feet on the cushion and prepared the momentum necessary for his next move.

    “Fine, _mom_ ,” he sighed, tossing a teasing smile to his best friend. “Pidge, cover me.”

    “I gotchu.” Her mouth was full of Doritos and she was furiously rubbing nacho cheese powder off onto her jeans, but Lance was pretty confident that the woman could win this game with a single hand and her eyes covered. So he took a moment and pushed off the back of the couch, rolling backwards onto the floor. It ended up as a  sloppy movement, due to his long limbs and a certain lack of planning on his part. Pidge had done her part, though and ensured he didn’t get sent back to their starting place, 35K points down and defenseless to the world as an infant. Seconds later, Lance had righted himself  and leaned back against the couch with his legs crossed beneath him.

    “Aannndddd I’m back in,” Lance announced, his thumbs navigating over the buttons and the d-pad with great accuracy.

    “Good,” Pidge said with a single nod. “Now get the _fucking_ sentries.”

    Lance was tempted to salute. He opted for a large grin and a laugh. “Yes ma’am!”

    Yep. He really enjoyed the company.

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** u kno whats cool

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** whats cool is gettin a sub at 13:40 bc linear algebra isnt even in your vocab until nxt week

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** if it isn’t in your vocabulary, then how did you type linear algebra

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** Pidge y r u like this

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** because you make it too easy dih

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** oh yeah? Dih?

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** Yep ok we’re stopping this train right here.

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** But Mother

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** e n o u g h

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** okokokokok O K

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** real talk tho are we still down for going downtown tonite?

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** oohh I forgot that htat wasa  thing we were doing

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** hold up

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** when are we meeting up

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** guys

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** shiro said 5 so weve got time to prepare or whatever yall need to do before we go

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** OK HI HOLD UP

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** what is it?

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** what meetup? I didnt know abt any meetup

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** are you guys meeting shiro wthout me?

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** I told you about this leik three days ago man

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** Shrio’s little brother is getting work done on his shoulder and shiro says he needs Moral Support

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** work done?

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** yup. shiro said that keith was gettin a tattoo and keith invited me to go watch bc i am friends with keith and p soon it was deigned an official Outing wherein keith gets a tat and we go eat smthn

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** I’m pretty sure we told you this Lance

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** huh. No i don’t remember that and i have an excellent memory

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** ok so are you coming or what man

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** I mean I dont even know the guy are you sure its ok if I come?

 **_LimeGreenBaby:_ ** trust me if ur cool w shiro ur cool w keith

 **_BabyBlueBoi:_ ** I mean if you guys are sure and stuff

 **_MellowYellowMama:_ ** come onnnnnnnn of course we’re sure

         And so, without planning, rhyme or reason, Lance’s previous plans of chilling on Pidge’s couch with Netflix and some good take out were suddenly replaced with spontaneity.

    Not spontaneity, per se, since _apparently_ it had all been planned several days ago - but to Lance, who knew nothing about it, this came out of nowhere and it was totally spontaneous in his book.

    However, as it usually turned out, no matter how many days in advance it _was_ planned, shit always gets left out the initial planning time, strategy, _talk time thingie_ \- like where they were all going to meet up. You know, if Lance had been in on the planning process, _the loop_ , as it were, then he would totally would have been able to iron out the details for them. Even as sleep deprived as he was, a shitty planner with no foresight he was not. He knew how to line things up. He knew the optimal outing strategy.

    When the time came for the trio to head out to meet up with Shiro and the others, Lance asked a simple question, one that should have been a pretty simplistic answer to match, since it was imperative to how the beginning of their evening panned out. They were all out in front of Pidge’s apartment building, getting ready to hail a cab and...

     “So where are we meeting up?”

    It was like time had frozen. Hunk stopped fidgeting with his jacket’s zipper and Pidge’s thumbs paused over her phone’s screen. Slowly, she looked up and locked eyes with Hunk. There were were a few silent words exchanged between the two and that spoke volumes between them all.

    “We, uh,” Pidge started, then paused, looking back down to her phone, tapping at the iMessage faster than before.

    “We don’t have a place to meet up, do we?”

    “Of course we do, we totally have a meeting place. I mean, right Pidge? We totally have a place to meet up.” Hunk ran his zip up and down, the sides of his jacket closing and opening constantly as he glanced constantly  to the young woman for an update she quickly trying to procure.

    “Yeah, of course we do. Lance how could you have such little faith in us?” She glanced up to him for all of a half of a second before she was focused again. “I mean we’re not you; we know how to communicate, thanks.”

    Lance spluttered, a hand splaying across his chest. He was only a tiny bit surprised when the combination of the wind and how he flung his head back didn’t knock the snapback off of his head. “I’m hurt, Pidgeo. Real goddamn hurt. Just remember that when you get married and ask me to be your best man that I’m not planning your bachelor party.”

    “Wait, what? You’re having Lance as your best man? I thought you told me that I would be your best man.” Hunk pulled the zip all the way up to his neck - a sort of protective shield, Lance figured.

    Pidge rolled her eyes. “If I can have a bachelor party, I can have two best men,” she reasoned. “Now, somebody hail a cab; we’re meeting Shiro directly at the parlor since Keith’s appointment is in like twenty minutes.”

         Hunk ended up hailing the cab, he was good like that. People were always naturally drawn to Hunk - Lance wondered if that applied to cabbies as well, ‘cause that’d be pretty rad.

    They ended up being late. Yes, Lance blamed The Cohorts, but he didn’t chastise them too hard. ‘Cause he was a good friend like that. Live and learn or whatever. He was just trying to help the kiddies learn in his own way that may or may not have been saying _I told you so_ six times.

    The parlor wasn’t the biggest one Lance had seen, but it wasn’t cramped, either. He thought that maybe the mirrors lining the walls gave the illusion that it was bigger than it actually was.

    As soon as they came through the glass doors, they spotted their small group at the back of the place. It was pretty easy, considering the group consisted of a large hunk of a human and another almost-ginger who was half the size of the beefstack. And I mean, there was another person on the table, shirtless with some kind of work getting done on his shoulder blade, like Pidge had said would be happening. So there was that.

    Hunk had to explain to the lady at the front counter about their intentions before they were allowed to approach the group - by that time, Shiro had already spotted them, wordlessly greeting them with a smile and a little wave of his hand.

Which was when Matthew caught sight of them and proceeded to hail them over like he was flagging down and guiding a plane in to land.

    The imagery made Lance grin as the trio joined the others at the end of the shop, weaving through work stations and little stools and shelves.

    You know, normally, it takes something big to wipe a smile off of Lance’s face. It takes a major offense, or some disaster to make Lance frown after a smile as big as the one  that had  just made an appearance on his face. So, really, it was an odd  thing that Lance, seeing in the wall-mounted mirrors, the pain-contorted face of Shiro’s little brother for the first (second?) time; had the smile gone in less than a second. It sent color rising to his cheeks - the blotchy, embarrassing kind - and his jaw dropped, eyes widening.

    He muttered a curse, his fingers scrabbling out to hook a finger into Hunk’s belt loop. Hunk stopped short, looking over his shoulder at his best friend. He frowned at the manic look in his eyes and the tint in his cheeks.

    “Dude, are you alright? Are you gonna hurl?” He winced at his own words and how Lance only seemed to worsen at his words. “Oh God, man. Please don’t hurl. You know I will if you do.”

    Lance seemed to figure out how to words again, because he was shaking his head, his snapback wiggling as he did. “No. Hunk; I’m not going to be sick.” He paused, made a face and paled a little. “Okay, I might be sick. More of the embarrassed kind of sick.”

    “Why? What happened-?”

    Shiro had since caught on to Lance and his sudden bout of stomach bug, because he was stepping away from the table with his brother with a look of concern. He came up and placed a comforting, well meaning, totally unnecessary hand on his shoulder. “Are you okay, Lance? You look a little pale.”

    “No, I’m - uh,  I’m good, I just-.” He stopped short, his eyes flicking to the mirror, to check back up on the young man in the mirror. He didn’t expect him to be looking back at the commotion - or for their eyes to lock - or for the radio station’s desk guy to still look really goddamn cute. Those dark eyes looked at him curiously, definitely recognizing him. He opened his mouth, like he was about to say something before the words were replaced with a wince. His eyes were screwed shut and he visually hissed, if that was a thing. Like his teeth clenched and his head cocked in a little way that Lance could almost hear the little inhalation against the noise of the tattoo parlor.

    Even past the sympathy pains that suddenly shot through Lance’s shoulder, the broken eye contact between him and (what was his name? Shit, Lance forgot his name.) McCutie (Okay, shit what was that nickname? Really awful. Like, for Chrissake what kind of nickname is _McCutie_?), or rather, Shiro’s little brother, Lance was able to think again (see: stop wigging the hell out on everyone). But, really, just how small was the world - that Shiro’s bouncing baby brother ended up being the guy from the radio station? It was weird, right? Lance wasn’t the only one who thought it was weird?

    “Lance?” Shiro pressed again, the grip tightening on his shoulder. “You good?”

    He swallowed, took a breath and stamped down the crazy swirling off in his head. “I’m _fine_ , Shiro. It’s just uh, _that’s_ your brother?” He gestured in the vague direction of the table with the hand not still occupied with being threaded along with Hunk’s belt.

    “Yeah, Keith.” Shiro cocked his head, moving his hand from Lance’s shoulder to his forehead. “Are you sure that you’re alright?”

    Lance shrugged a shoulder. He took his hand back from Hunk and used it to whisk Shiro’s hand away from his face. “I’m fine, Shiro. Completely and utterly cool. Chill as a cucumber.” He shook out his shoulders and resigned himself to a long, _very long_ night.

         Lance and Hunk stayed back for the most part; Hunk because of uneasiness around blood (he was fine getting work done on his own, but by God, it was too much to see someone _else_ get work done and that got him) and Lance because he was a supportive best friend who knew when to step back and be with his bro. If being with his bro  kept him out of a situation potentially loaded with awkward tension, well then, who was Lance to complain?

    Once Keith’s tattoo was done and the the bandage was getting put on, the two of them were hailed over.

    “Guys, this is my brother Keith,” Shiro said as they came to the little bed. Hunk waited until Keith’s bandage was applied and a shirt was shrugged on before l he shook his hand with a cheery “Hey, I’m Hunk; nice to meet you!”

    “Yeah, you too,” Keith returned the greeting with a nod of his head. He looked at Lance then, a teasing smile took over.

Lance was a weak enough, gay enough person without _that smile_ working its way into his day, thanks very much.

    “Lance Vasquez.” His voice was light and it did unmentionable, unspeakable things to Lance’s chest. “A Wonderful World, right?”

    Lance laughed breathily. “A Wondrous Place, actually.”

    “Yeah, that was it.” That smile again. Goddammit. “How’s that working out for you, by the way?”

    Lance gave a dry laugh. “Just great, you know, wakefulness has never been better.”

    “You guys know each other?” Pidge asked, looking around her brother to eye Lance suspiciously.

    Lance shrugged. “No. We’ve just talked before.”

    “Huh,” Pidge said, glancing between the two of them.

    The moment of increasing discomfort was broken when Hunk came up between Pidge and Lance, throwing his arms around them. “Let’s go eat!” he cheered.

         Hours later, the group ambled through the streets of St. Louis, spirits high. The street lights were a pleasant orange against the dark buildings, with just enough bustling people around them to give a buffer of background noise as they walked. Pidge was piggybacked on Shiro, kicking her feet out joyfully as Matt muttered something about boyfriend privileges and how he ought to be the one in Katie’s place. Lance and Hunk walked  closely together, occasionally bumping elbows or shoulders, meeting up for little twirls of made up dances. Hunk took Lance’s hand and twisted him around. Lance, light on his feet took it in stride, twirling before coming back and taking Hunk’s other hand, loosely dancing down the sidewalk.

    Now Keith - Keith hovered. He dropped back like he wasn’t part of the group and he ducked his head. His hands were shoved so deep inside the pockets of his faux leather jacket that Lance vaguely wondered if he would ever get them back out. He looked down, exclusively, at his sneakers pounding at the pavement unless there was something to look up for, some sort of talking point.

    Lance hooked his arm with Hunk’s but kept casting glances over his shoulder to watch the younger man. Everything had gone well with dinner, he believed. But, Keith seemed a little distant, maybe a little shy or closed off.

    After a split second of consideration, Lance took his arm back and dropped back as well. Hunk look back to him but he shrugged off the look with a little smile and a nod in Keith’s direction.

    He dropped back, falling into step with Keith, who looked pretty pensive over his worn out Converse. Lance took a second to hover closer so that they bumped shoulders.

    “Yo Keith,” he murmured. The young man’s head shot up, his eyes wide and curious.

    “What?”

    A smile lit up Lance’s face. “Dance with me,” he said, prodding his shoulder again.

    Keith paused, in step, in words - in breath, if Lance had seen rightly. “What?” he repeated, a little more bewildered this time. “We’re in the middle of a street, Lance.”

    “I’m not asking you to ballroom waltz it, Keith. C’mon.” He offered a hand as he twisted in step so that he walked backwards. “Dance with me.”

    Keith looked at his hand again, huffed as he pulled his out of his pockets and took the hand offered. Lance grinned.

    “Look buddy, tipsy street dancing is an _art_ , one you need to get an education on.” Lance threaded their fingers together and tugged Keith so he was further up in the group. Once he caught up to Hunk he turned his focus back to Keith. They were still walking, but Lance took the moment to give a little shoulder shimmy, trying to get Keith to follow the movement. All he got were stiff steps and a confused look. Lance sighed. “Okay, first off: you’ve gotta loosen up. Your shoulders are about to be fucking petrified by how rigid they are.”

    “My shoulder _hurts_ , thanks,” Keith snapped.

    Realization dawned on Lance and he grimaced. “Right, sorry dude.” He loosened his grip on Keith’s hand so that he was barely holding on. “Here.” Keith let his other hand be taken captive.

    It was a loose rhythm that was mostly carried by Lance as his shoulders moved fluidly.

    Keith smiled, looking back and forth between Lance and the steps their feet started to take. “See, you only need to loosen up. I’m going to spin you now, try not to fall on your ass.”

    “Hardy fucking har har,” Keith snorted. He mellowed out as Lance let go of one hand and lifted the other. It was a quick thing, clumsy and… somehow really nice. Keith’s hair flicked with the movement and his fringe dropped from its proper place so that it fell more into his eyes.

    Lance was beginning to lose count of how many times he’s been struck with how attractive this guy was.

    They broke apart with easy smiles, Lance pleasantly surprised.

    “See? You’re not so bad.”

    “Thank my semi-decent teacher,” he replied cheekily, a grin teasing the corners of his mouth.

    Lance laughed at the quip before Lance was tugged out by Pidge, who demanded her own turn at the dance.

         The evening ended with Lance and Hunk splitting from the group and taking a cab home.

    Hunk melted back into his seat with a little sigh, his takeout box resting atop his thigh. “I had a good time,” he noted with a satisfied nod.

    “Same,” Lance replied. He propped an elbow up on the window and leaned his chin on his palm. “Seems like Keith’s good people.”

    Hunk smiled back and reached over to clap a hand on Lance’s shoulder. “Yeah I think so, too. I’m glad you two got along. I’d thought that it wouldn't work there for a minute.

    “I’m water,” Lance shrugged his shoulder, an easy smile on his face. Hunk made a confused face. “It’s a talent. I’m like a little kid. I bounce back at light speeds. Adjust to the situation like water in a glass. I’m smooth like that, you know?”

    “Ah,” Hunk hummed, understanding. “You go, man. Props to you.”

         The cab ride was peaceful, with various colored lights shining into the windows and the soft radio humming in the air. Sooner than later, they were splitting that fare and they were saying their goodbyes on the sidewalk connecting their two dormitories together.

    “Good night, man,” Hunk said over his shoulder, all deep and tired, the end of the sentence  elevating with the beginnings of a yawn.

    “Sleep well, buddy,” Lance bade him, waving and grinning at his best friend’s back before lowering himself back down to earth so he could turn around and start thumping down the sidewalk towards his dorm room and another session of restless tossing.

    The night was calm and there was a breeze that barely blew enough to tousle his hair. His snap back was threaded into a belt loop at his back so that it hung safely out of the way. He had taken it off just before dinner. The comment Keith had made towards the cap made him blush with just the memory. Pretty hair, he’d said.

     _Ugh_ , why did he have to be so cute? Like, Lance knew that he had only just met the guy ( _officially_ ) but even he couldn’t deny the beginnings of a little crush that bubbled to the surface. He threw a smile to the stars and kicked a foot out, trying to relieve the sudden burst of energy that began to run through his veins.

    “God,” he laughed and ran his hands across his face in a little movement. He giggled, because what kind of life was that? It was insane and the world really was small, wasn’t it?

    It was _hella_ small and full of coincidences set against Lance by the Higher Ups in an effort to embarrass him on a colossal level, no doubt.

   He found himself not caring. He has a good thing going right now. He hadn’t made too much of a fool out of himself in front of the boy with the silly, silly tattoo. He had a good time with his friends and hey, he might even get a good night’s sleep tonight.

    Well, one could dream, and two out of three was still a win.

    When he got back into his room, he quickly toed out of his shoes and stripped himself of his clothes until he was left simply in his boxer briefs. He delved under his blankets and took a breath. He found that the smile couldn’t be wiped from his face and it was, for better or for worse, there to stay.

    He let it linger and settled back into his blanket, looking up to his ceiling. He replayed bits of Keith’s voice in his head. His words played in Lance’s mind, along with how Keith’s mouth looked forming those words and how he looked when trying to convey emphasis. Lance remembered the smile, the little one as he set down his silverware, and the large one that shone when his older brother told that terrible joke. The jesting one he tried to hold back when he teased Matt and Shiro.

    Lance’s eyelids began to droop, the promise of sleep tugged them shut.

    His thoughts swam with images of Keith’s grin, of how he made quips about Lance.

    With that, Lance was able to fall asleep for what felt was the first time in days.

        A phone chime interrupted his sleep. He opened his eyes mid-snore, the snore broke itself up into parts. There was a string of unintelligible curses from Lance as he shifted, his arms coming up to support him as he tried to sit up. He blinked blearily at the sunshine coming in from his windows and the blaring trumpet rendition of the X-Files theme played to signal Pidge calling him.

    His hands fumbled for the phone, not stopping until the pads of his fingers touched the cold screen under his pillow. He answered the call sullenly, muttering some sort of greeting through lips that felt a bit too puffy to be his own.

     _“Lance, where the hell are you?”_ Pidge demanded. _“You’ve answered, like, none of my texts.”_

    Lance hummed, slipping the phone between his cheek and shoulder. He closed his eyes and ran his nails through his hair. “‘Iv’ been sleepin’,” he slurred. “What time is it?”

     _“It’s almost noon,”_ she told him. _“Did you just fall asleep?”_

    “Nah,” he said, smacking his lips. “When I came home last night.”

    He could practically hear Pidge’s eyebrows raise across the line. _“You slept through the night, huh?”_

    “Yeah.” She sniggered and it had Lance pausing. “What?”

    “ _Nothing, nothing,”_ she said. _“Just thinking. Probably has to do with Keith, is all.”_

    Lance frowned. “What’s he got to do with anything?” he asked, incredulous.

    Pidge sucked in a breath. ”So you don’t know,” she hummed. ”Interesting.”

    “What is?” Lance pressed, pretty confused by now.

    “Nothing,” she said again. “You’ll probably find out one way or another. Anyhow, we’re going to go hang out. You want to come with?”

    Lance fell back to his uncomfortable mattress and nuzzled his face back into his pillow. “I dunnoooo,” he muttered. “We just went out _last_ night.”

    “Yeah, that’s why you get a bonafide choice today instead of us guilting you into it. You wanna come?”

    “I don’t think so.” He cast a glance to his door and the laptop bag hanging from a hook on it. “I think I might do some writing today.”

    “Props, dude. Be productive.”

    “I’m gonna,” he assured her.

    The phone call didn’t last much longer. It was little more than Lance asking what they were all planning on doing, deciding that the baseball game she promised really didn’t win over his current plan, the one he had come up with on the spot, and then ended with a simple farewell from the both of them.

Sooner rather than later, Lance was throwing himself out of bed and making preparations to go and shower.

    The steam, or the hot water, perhaps both, left him feeling invigorated, happy and completely ready to go out into the world and make some goddamn art.

    He snagged up a ratty blanket and his laptop bag on his way out of his dorm room. After making a quick stop in the cafeteria for a bottle of water and some kind of non-messy fruit to keep him going and quell the beast that had began to make itself known inside his stomach, he was on his way. His first choice of location was the quad, as many of the students were off campus for break, or nursing hangovers in their dorms, so it would be mostly vacant. But eventually, after giving it some thought, he decided to take his things down to a small park a little ways off.

    His revised plan was perfect. He got out there and had everything set up with minimal trouble and in record time. Let the magic begin. His fingers tapped on the keyboard as he hummed contentedly to himself. Life was beautiful and so was the day.

    And then the _rains_ started. Frustrated, he stubbornly ignored the cloud dampening his cheery mood and continued writing. He typed out a few sentences, ignoring the big, fat drop that landed on the back of his hand. As well as another drop that landed squarely in his hair. Three more, this time on his keyboard. He couldn’t ignore them after that. He grudgingly shoved everything back into his backpack and slung it over his shoulders.

    A lousy, uncomfortable commute later, he was booking it from the bus station across campus in the pouring rain back to his dorm room. Hunk and Pidge had both texted him separately, asking if he was still out in the rain. He thought it was both _utterly_ hilarious that they thought he would hang out in the rain, and very thoughtful of them to be concerned.

    He texted them that he was okay while in the middle of swapping clothes, one leg still trapped in the damp prison of his soaked jeans. Dried off, he opted for a comfortable pair of sweats and pulled a hoodie over his still slightly-damp tee. He’d ignore it, it’d be fine as long as his pants were dry.

    And so, Lance settled in.

    Forty-five minutes later Lance continued to click about on his laptop, his cheeks puffed out in boredom. His creative writing inspiration had washed away with the rain, and he persistently went to great lengths to avoid the first couple of tabs set up in his Chrome window. They were the sources he was using for a paper that would be due in just under a week, but he just couldn’t summon the motivation to finish it.

    So instead he used the wiles of the internet to distract himself.

    He would have texted the group chat, but Hunk had passed out half an hour earlier and Pidge  had entered her **_Do Not Disturb_ ** mode, on account of a project she was finally tackling. It was a terrifying mode if he’d ever seen one.

    Rummaging through several pages of obscure websites, he found only measly bits of entertainment. Nothing quite grand enough to distract from the bogging guilty feeling of procrastination that rolled down his back like a cold marble.

   Finally, he shut his laptop and rolled over with a groan.

   He was almost ready to start his paper, if for no other reason to distract himself from the void of _boredom_.

    He waited all of sixteen seconds, in hopes that his problem would magically resolve itself, before sighing and reaching for his laptop again. He had the lid open and had begun looking through his research tabs just before an alert from his phone caught his attention.

    Fully expecting a text from Pidge, Lance grabbed at his phone.

    The light on the back blinked incessantly, signaling the message, and the screen was lit up to showcase a text bubble. Not from Pidge, though. **_Keith K._ ** stared up at him innocently despite Lance’s blatant confusion as to why _Keith_ of all people would text him at five in the afternoon.

    Lance deliberately took his time opening the message, like revealing the contents would trigger his phone to self destruct into oblivion.

    **_Keith K.:_ ** https://enderiolu.deviantart.com/favourites/72662104/Cryptid-puns

    ** _Keith K.:_** This is right up your alley.

    Lance clicked on the link. It brought him to an artist's webpage, full of utterly adorable little figures. They were all visual puns, in an adorable art style that Lance absolutely and immediately fell in love with.

     **BabyBlueBoi:** these are the cutest wtaf how did you find these???

     **Keith K.:** Matt sent them to me, actually.

     **Keith K.:** They reminded me of you.

     **BabyBlueBoi:** that’s sweet  <3333

     **Keith K.:** :)

    Lance tapped his thumbs on the sides of his phone for a solid few seconds, trying to come up with a response. There wasn’t anywhere you could go with an emoji - unless you were going to start down  the route that would have them sending a billion emojis.

    He sighed, trying to think of how to bend the conversation to a more _wordy_ path. He stared at Keith’s screen name for maybe a second too long before it clicked.

     **BabyBlueBoi:** know what

     **Keith K.:** Hm?

     **BabyBlueBoi:** you oughta join the groupchat with hunk n pidge n me

     **BabyBlueBoi:** it’s p crazy sometimes but we’re worth it :)

     **BabyBlueBoi:** all youd need for us to induct you into our ranks is a name change

    He was about to outline how everyone of them had matching names - getting a matching name was sort of like a right of passage. He was _going_ to tell Keith all this, but Keith beat him to the punch.

     **Keith K.:** A name change? Careful, Lance. Sounds awfully like a marriage proposal.

    Lance snorted, smiling carelessly to himself.

     **BabyBlueBoi:** oh please. I’ve more class than that.

     **BabyBlueBoi:** i’d ask you out on at least one date first.

     **Keith K.:** Oh yeah? And if I were to say yes?

     _Well fuck,_ was really the only thought that stuck Lance’s head at that moment.

     **BabyBlueBoi:** well then…

    He chose to ignore the way his heart hammered in his chest as he typed his next message out slowly, letter by letter, as if he were trying to get his head on straight before the text was finished and sent.

     **BabyBlueBoi:** Do you wanna go out with me sometime, Keith?

    Once the text was sent, it was sent. There was no taking it back. As he sent the message, Lance didn’t think that there would be a reason to take it back. Well, that is until Keith didn’t reply straight away. He expected some kind of exasperated emoji or a playful answer that they both knew mean _No_. But no. No. There was silence. Radio silence that made Lance’s stomach twist with nerves. Suddenly there was a text bubble. It processed, showing Keith was typing. But the text never came. It only deepened Lance’s nerves.

    The speech bubbles popped up again. They milled for a good thirty seconds, then paused for a minute or two before picking up again. Lance squinted at the screen before dropping the phone face down on his chest, sighing in exasperation.

    He rolled his heel against the sheets, looking up at the spider on his ceiling.

    “Come on,” he muttered aloud, trying to chide Keith into replying simply by some telepathic connection. He picked the phone up again and it was still, the bubbles gone. Lance groaned, tipping his head back to the ceiling again. “Little dude,” he spoke to the small spider above him. “If I die right now, you make sure and tell the police that it was Keith’s fault.” He picked up his phone. The bubbles were altogether gone this time. He sighed. His thumbs tapped the sides of his phone, contemplating whether or not to take his words back. Surely, it was too late now. There was no way he could take it back without looking like an incredibly sad individual.

    He started to tap out the words to begin his apology when suddenly the message screen disappeared and a darker one took its place. A chime, some generic theme began to play as Keith’s call rang.

    Lance made a sound that wasn’t quite a scream in the back of his throat as he debated picking up the call. Quickly, he swiped the green circle and pressed the phone to his ear.

    “Keith?” he asked. He didn’t _mean_ to sound as confused to the call as he was, but hey man, sometimes you can’t help that shit. “Listen, man, I didn’t mean to-.” The rush of words coming out of the receiver ran all together as they interrupted Lance’s own choppy flow of words. Lance paused, frowning. “Wait hold up? What did you say? I gotta make sure you said what I think you said.”

    There was a moment of silence, broken only by the crackle in the receiver as Keith breathed. “I asked…” he trailed off, his words stagnant. “I just asked if you were serious. And, if you wanted to, you know, go out with me. If you’re not busy.”

    Lance dropped his jaw to his chest, his eyes going wide as he looked at the spider above. He pressed the phone mic into the shoulder of his tee and frantically mouthed an excited string of words to his little friend up above. It was along the lines of “Oh holy mother of God, what the shit” among a whole other string of expletives.

    Once he put himself back together, he put the phone back to his ear.

    “Hello?” Keith asked, the word sounding a little hollow. “Did I read this situation wrong? You were really joking, huh?”

    It was then that Lance’s mind kicked back into gear. “No! No, I meant exactly what I said. I’d really like to go out with you.”

    “Oh.” There was a cautious sort of excitement there that had Lance smiling. “Cool. I’ll uh, we’ll figure something out to do, and the time later. I didn’t really have time to think everything out.”

    “That’s fine,” Lance assured him. “We’ll get it figured out. It’ll be great.”

    “It’ll be great,” Keith parroted. Lance could hear the grin in his voice - it made it all the harder to try and calm his smile.

         The hardest part about “getting it figured out” was keeping a lid on it all. Lance wanted to tell Hunk and Pidge more than anything, but every time he went to, he bit the inside of his cheek to keep himself from saying anything.

    He knew how it would end up. They would go all _protective friend mode_ and then sniff out Keith. Pidge would get hot on the background check and Hunk would perform the Honorary Shovel Talk. If that didn’t scare Keith away, nothing would, honestly.

    It took a tough man to stand up against Hunk Garrett and Katie “The Pigeon” Holt and survive.

    Lance didn’t know if Keith was made of _The Stuff_ yet, so he just kept a lid on it and danced his Victory Dance to himself. In his dorm room. In the dark.

    Lance sometimes got weird when he wasn’t around people. But there was no one to see so who was going to care?

    The date was set a couple of days after the phone call. It would be something extremely simple, what with pizza in Keith’s dorm room. Lance appreciated the quiet, and really, he didn’t like going out with people to fancy dinners unless he was actually familiar with them. He had suffered through too many silences over expensive dinner options all because that’s where his partner insisted they go for their first date.

    He saw this as sort of a field test, since he was a firm believer in the fact that if you can’t get along with someone in the quiet intimacy of a dorm room, then you can’t get along at all.

    Lance also had rather odd beliefs.

    He was pretty odd in general, wow.

    This was a thought he dwelled on a lot as he anticipated seeing Keith again. It boiled and refined, reducing itself into a sticky little anxiety that took over and left him jittery.

    Which, really, is what he blamed for his opening line as Keith opened his door. “Aren’t you a little afraid that you’ll get sick of me, making our date so close?” Lance carted the pizza and sodas into the room and dropped them carefully onto Keith’s desk.

    Keith frowned slightly and closed the door behind Lance. His brows knitted together. “No? Why would I?”

    “I dunno.” Lance shuffled, his socked feet skidding against the carpet. “People usually do.” He gave a weak laugh.

    Keith’s frown sank even deeper as he moved past Lance to fish through the plastic bag of sodas. “I don’t see why they would,” he commented. Lance’s eyes widened and he looked over his shoulder to the other man. He could just barely see the tips of Keith’s ears coloring a soft pink. Lance blinked at him.

    “What do you mean?” he asked, his nose scrunching curiously.

    “I mean, I don’t see how they can… get sick of you.” Keith opened the pizza box. He took a slice of pepperoni and turned back to Lance. “I mean your memes are awful, but I’m not about to be run off because of a little thing like that.”

    It took a full second for Lance to remember how to breathe again. He had to fight this feeling that left his chest feeling elated. There were butterflies running amok in his stomach and it seemed like he had forgotten how English worked.

    After a moment, however, he came back to himself. He grinned, not bothering to hide the flush on his cheeks. He didn’t know what to say to that. So he went with the ever-obvious, “You love my memes, man. Don’t even lie!”

    Keith snorted. “You send old-ass memes from 2011. I’ve never, _ever_ seen you send a quality meme.”

    “Babe, I _am_ a quality meme,” Lance pointed out.

    Keith paused, a bit of pizza hovering in his opened mouth. “I mean.” The words were jumbled as he took the bite. “You’re not _wrong_.”

    Lance took the praise with a grin, holding his chin high.

    Later, Lance spoke up in a moment of comfortable silence.

    “So, tell me.”

    Keith looked up and over at Lance’s voice. “Tell you what?” he murmured over the hum of the radio.

    Lance flopped over on the floor. His neck was twisted in an awkward sort of way as he looked at Keith upside down. “What was the tattoo you were getting the other day?” He reached over his head for the bag of abandoned Fritos on the floor, fishing a spare few out with his fingers. “When we first met,” he added needlessly.

    Keith shifted, tucked legs under himself and sat up on his knees, making a small, breathy sound as he did. He unzipped his hoodie and threw one side of it over his shoulder, displaying the small string of text. He heard Lance make some kind of “oof” sound as he rolled right side up. He heard him mutter the words as he read them, and then came a snort of laughter.

    “I want to believe,” he said again. “Why aliens?”

    Keith sat down, unfolding his legs as he did. He forewent fixing the thin back hoodie and simply tossed it aside as he spoke. "Shiro and I always used to watch the X Files reruns when the came on. It's no big deal." He gave a shrug as he needlessly tried to justify his reasoning to the cute boy.

    “It’s cute,” Lance cooed. It didn’t sound patronizing, but rather sincere. “I like it. The retro Roswell alien was a good choice, too, dude. Nice touch.”

    Keith hummed happily and reached over to grab his hoodie again. He pulled it back up over his shoulder and zipped it up. “Thanks,” he said, at an utter loss of what else to say. So he tapped his fingers along his knee and licked his lips. He felt like he needed to wash his face to rid himself of the grease residue of the pizza, but unwilling to get up, he made do and scrubbed over his mouth with a brown paper napkin, watching Lance as he checked something out on his phone. He looked over the boy, how his hair curled around his temples and how his eyes glittered in the light from his too-bright screen.

    Keith shook himself, told himself to quit staring. He was going to scare Lance off or something equally as undesirable. So instead he crumpled the napkin under his fingers and steeled his resolve. He cleared his throat and Lance glanced up at him with those brilliant blue eyes, curious at the sudden noise.

    He just shrugged, and Lance smiled softly at him for a second before his attention was drawn back to his phone. Keith rolled over to the side of his bed and pulled his laptop out from under it. He lifted the lid and pulled up Netflix.

    After five seconds of browsing, his eyes were caught by a bright, rainbow colored banner for a show and he grinned. He looked back up to Lance.

    “Have you ever seen Sense 8?” he asked.

    Lance looked up at him, lips pursed. “I don’t think so. What’s it about?”

    Keith’s jaw dropped at him. He sat up on the bed, taking his laptop with him. “It’s great,” he assured Lance, “I know I’m going to fuck up the explanation if I even try, so...” He patted the bed sheets beside him and Lance was quick about climbing up next to Keith, shimmying up to make a place for himself.

    Now. Keith wasn’t an expert as far as dates went - and a small one, though it was…

    As the night progressed, h thought it went pretty damn well.

         The next morning, Lance tapped his toe on the flooring. He raised his hand to knock on Hunk’s door again, but thought better of it and dropped it to his side again. He tossed a look down the left side of the hall and then the opposite way. He reconsidered the knock and before he could hesitate again, rapped his knuckles against the door. Eight times in rapid succession is what it took for Hunk to finally crack open the door, his eyes narrowed comically. Whether it was from sleep or frustration, Lance couldn’t tell.

    “Good morning sunshine. I’ve got _news_.”

    Hunk opened the door and let him in with little more than a grumble. Lance placed himself on the edge of Hunk’s roommate’s desk chair while Hunk simply sat back down on his mattress among the mess of blankets and sheets. He was up for all of six seconds before he was falling down to his back, rubbing tired hands over his face.

    “What’s your news?” Hunk asked through a yawn. He picked his head up to look blearily at his best friend. Lance took the time to twirl around in the chair, to sit on the news and let Hunk _wonder_ about it for about half of a minute before he planted his feet on the floor. His eyes were wide and excited. He hummed with unspent, contained energy.

    “I went on a date last night,” he said giddily, a wide smile pulling at the corners of his mouth.

    That woke Hunk up, he propped himself back on his elbows. “A date?” he echoed.

    Lance bobbed his head. “Yeah. A date. We’ve been talking about it since, like, Thursday or something, but anyway-.”

    “Wait, Lance, date with who?” he sat fully upright, definitely more awake now.

    “Keith, duh. Since we traded numbers, we’ve been texting back and forth and shit.” He shrugged. “You know me, I’m a compulsive flirt over text, but like, he _flirted_ back. And my passing attraction to him is now like, I dunno, a crush or something? Like, I think I like him, Hunk. A lot.” His eyes were wide with his point, puffing his cheeks out with air. “And then he asked me out on a date, which happened last night.” His fingers fussed with his cuff to give him a distraction. “He didn’t push any, like, weird sex stuff, or personal space issues, or whatever, like I kind of expected? Nah, it was just all chill and cool, and he was cool with boundaries and stuff, and he asked before he kissed me. And Hunk! He kissed me! I was getting ready to go, and _he just_ \- and he. _Oh my God._ He’s a great kisser, Hunk, you would not even _believe_.”

    “You’re rambling,” Hunk pointed out. He rubbed his hand over his face as Lance’s words came to a halt. “How come I hadn’t heard of this?” he asked curiously, looking up at Lance through his fingers.

    Lance’s cheeks warmed. “Er… I dunno. It was just pretty new.” The way he trailed off uncertainly made it sound more like a question than a statement. He knew that Hunk could see that way he seemed to crumble in on himself, the little smile he tried to hide in his shoulder.

    The eyebrow Hunk lifted and the teasing smile made it a little too evident that his best friend knew what was up.

    “Oh yeah?” Hunk hummed. “You must really like him, then, if you’re keeping him as your dirty little secret.”

    Lance snorted, rolling his eyes. “It isn’t like that,” he argued. “It’s more like… I just want to get to know him right now. I don’t want to get my hopes too up because if _you guys_ like him, and it doesn’t work out, then it’ll be _hella_ awkward.” Just the thought of it made Lance wanna scrunch his nose up and stick his tongue out in distaste.

    “Alright, I get that,” Hunk said. He stood up and began to stretch his arms over his head, bowing his back slightly. He groaned lowly with the stretch. “It’s funny though, it’s been awhile since I’ve seen you excited like this over someone.”

    “I…” He teethed at the corner of his lip for a moment, trying to suppress a smile. “I like him. A lot.” He gave up holding in his smile and he positively beamed at his best friend. “I know I said he was good people, but I _really_ like him, Hunk.”

    Hunk let his arms dropped to his sides, a teasing smile on his face. “Well. I guess I’d better call Pidge.”

    Lance frowned. “Why’s that?”

    “We’ve got to prepare the shovel talk. Duh.” He moved to the side of the bed, going for his cell phone sitting innocently on the nightstand.

    Lance’s eyes widened as he picked the phone up and pressed the home button. “NO!” he yelled suddenly. His plan to launch out of the roller chair failed, as he was straddling the back of it. Lance got caught on the back and was sent falling to the floor, the chair coming down with him. He half crawled across the floor, his legs still tangled in with this chair as he fought with it.

    Hunk laughed, putting distance between them as he rolled over his bed, tucking himself into the farthest corner away from Lance, still tapping wildly on the phone.

    “Hunk don’t you _dare_ !” Lance gasped, wrestling his legs away from the chair and finally making to scurry onto Hunk’s bed. He grabbed at the phone, but Hunk lifted it above his head. “Don’t call her! _Hunk_!”

    Hunk was still laughing. Wildly. Lance was surprised that he was still conscious, it seemed like Hunk should have passed out from oxygen deprivation.

    He wasn’t so lucky, it seemed, because within seconds, he heard the phone connect and Pidge answer the call with a grumpy little one-liner.

    “Pidge!” Hunk wheezed. “Lan-!”

    “No!” Lance cut him off, focusing on silencing Hunk instead of wrangling the device from him. He pressed the palm of his hand over his best friend’s mouth.

    “What’s going on?” Pidge demanded. “What are you two doing?”

    Lance made eye contact with Hunk and in that instant, Lance saw the glimmer in Hunk’s eyes. He saw the very future that would come to pass in the next second or two and he was _not pleased_ with it _at all_.

    “Don’t you dare,” he muttered, just as he felt Hunk’s mouth form into a grin underneath his palm. “Hunk Garrett, _don’t you fucking dare_ -!”

    Hunk did it.

    Lance practically shrieked, jolting back away from his best friend. “HOW COULD YOU?” he demanded. He grabbed Hunk’s arm  with one hand and wiped the saliva off onto Hunk’s shirt with the other.

    “How could who do what?” Pidge asked. “I’m coming down there unless someone tells me why you called me!”

    “Lance went out on a date last night!” Hunk said. His words all stuck together, like honey clinging to a spoon. Pidge seemed to understand them because there was a horrid thump on her end of the line.

    “What?! With who?!” He voice was strained and she hissed after a moment, gasping after phantom pains.

    Lance groaned loudly, going as limp as he possibly could, face planting into Hunk’s soft belly. “ _Guuyyyyyyyyssss_.” His voice was pleading. Practically begging. “Please, just drop it.”

    “Man, Matt’s not gonna beli _eve_ this!” Pidge proclaimed.

    “First of all: _ouch_ , Pidge. Ouch. Second-,” he leaned up on his elbows on either of Hunk’s sides, his chin propped atop his friend’s stomach.

    “Ow, ow, ow,” Hunk muttered, pushing at his head. “Your chin is pointy, dude.”

    Lance shot him a little look that spoke of well-deserved revenge, but he slung an arm over Hunk’s stomach and instead leaned down on that. “Secondly,” he continued. “C’mon guys. It’s _new_. Couldn’t you both wait at least a week before calling everyone we know, including Pidge’s parents? I don’t want to get a billion phone calls congratulating me on my new boyfriend that’s not even officially my boyfriend yet.”

    Hunk, being on the receiving end of Lance’s look, held out as long as he could but eventually withered under the weight of those pleading, blue eyes.Hunk’s belly deflated with a sigh, jostling Lance a little in the process. “Alright. I won’t tell anyone else.”

    Lance smiled at him. “Thank you,” he said, relieved.

    Pidge made a little sound. And then she sighed. “ _Fine_ ,” she huffed. “I won’t tell anyone ‘till you give the OK.” Lance grinned.

    “Thank you,” he cooed, a little louder.

    “Whatever,” she grumbled. There was a lull. “So. You went on a date. I want the details.”

         Details is what she got.

    Looking back, Lance wasn’t sure just _how_ she pried all of that lovely tea out of him, but she did it efficiently. Quickly, he had descended into little rambles about how fond he was of Keith and how funny he was and how smart he was and how his taste in TV shows wasn’t half bad, actually.

    He ended up sipping his latte dreamily as he talked to his two best friends, stuck in a comfortable corner in some odd-ball coffee shop.

    By the end, he had realized his mistakes and clammed up. Pidge was regarding him with a fond expression. She had her laptop out, but her quick typing had slowed as time went on and she paid more attention to him.

    Hunk, sitting beside Lance was cooing over every other sentiment. He had gone through no less than four very sweet peppermint drinks in their time there and the sugar high was beginning to show. The big guy’s leg bounced under the table, his knee shifting against Lance’s thigh, but he didn’t move away. His questions about Keith were quicker in coming and he talked more with his hands.

    “So he’s…” Lance trailed off, suddenly self conscious. “He’s great.” He traced his finger up the side of his cup, following the vertical divots in the ceramic. He looked at both of his friends sharply. “So no threatening him, got it!?”

   Pidge did little more than wink at him, promising nothing, while Hunk did lift his hand and solemnly promise  that he would have no hand in anything further than a casual shovel talk.

    That satisfied Lance and he settled back into his seat, grinning like a fool.

    “Awww, look at that, Pidge,” Hunk cooed, poking at Lance’s side. Lance yelped and jumped to attention, too ticklish for that nonsense. “He’s in _looovvveeee_.”

    Lance spluttered, trying to deny the notion, head shaking and hands trying to wave the suggestion away.

    Hunk laughed, full-bodied and loud. Pidge snorted with laughter and started typing at her keyboard again. Lance shrunk into his chair and tried to convince himself that what Hunk said _really_ wasn’t the case.

         _And he did a ruddy horrible job of it, too._

    They were two months and seven official dates (the breakfasts didn’t count, not really. Neither did that picnic, or the times Lance came to bother Keith at work - most of which landed them kissing in a closet. If Lance counted them, there would simply be far too much to count.) together, and Lance found himself utterly _smitten_.

    There were still little moments when Keith’s voice would sound achingly familiar. When Lance brought this up to Keith, he just hummed thoughtfully, his nose all scrunched up as he contemplated it.

    It seemed Keith came up with better answers than Lance did, but never shared them. Which was odd, but whatever, dude. It wasn’t like Lance had picked it up from some weird, god-awful place like a porn site or something similar. Because that was… just gross. And it definitely would not be the case, here.

    When Lance asked him about it again, Keith told him that he’d tell him soon. That was cryptic.

    Weird thing was, it seemed like Pidge was bloody well in on it. He’d mentioned it between stolen bites of Matt’s Captain Crunch cereal and she had frowned. “He hasn’t said anything yet?” she asked, nonplussed. He couldn’t get what that meant out of her. She said it wasn’t her thing to tell. It was getting kind of really concerning.

    It was bothering him enough that Lance was getting ready to confront him with it, honestly. Pidge took mercy upon his soul and assured him that it wasn’t anything bad. Not even a little bit. That relieved Lance’s nerves a bit, but it didn’t soften the little ache in the back of his throat when he got reminded of the whole affair of secrecy.

    Keith would tell him. In his own time.

    It was sure to be fine.

         It might not have been as fine as he had hoped.

    There was a certain level of vulnerability to Lance at that very moment.

    When the secret finally unraveled, Lance was in his pajamas, first off. It was little more than a pair of sweatpants, an old and certainly worn out tee and a pair of sneakers. Another point of noteworthiness was his barefaced-ness. No concealer, no tinted sunscreen, only a bit of moisturizer. His dark under eye circles were on full display, something that he normally _never_ let see the light of day. He pulled open the doors of the radio station with wariness creeping up the back of his spine. There was no rhyme, nor reason for the mysterious text of ‘ _please come down to the station.’_

    Really, the only reason he could think of for being summoned down here would be if Keith had brought him here for some weird midnight adventure to be played to the background tune of the shitty opera-screamo they played after midnight at the station.

    It wasn’t an uncommon occurrence for Keith to sneak them out at night; he knew of Lance’s insomnia and really tried to help him in any way that he could - even if it was just providing company for the night. Sometimes they would sit out in the courtyard, looking up at all the pinpricks stars dotting the sky. Other times they would roam the streets of the city, going to little mom and pop places that were open so late and look at the lights and just take in the city.

    Lance teethed at his lip, looking around.

    He’d been in the radio station before, but never at night.

     Lance caught his breath, looking around the lobby for Keith. There wasn’t a hint of him. It was all dark and eerie in its own way. The seats were empty and where the usual mess on the coffee table sat, there were stacked magazines and carefully placed coasters. Everything about the room sparkled cleanly in one way or the next. It was odd, out of character for a room for as far as rooms have character.

   The light on the wall above the front desk was on and blinking, slowly, rhythmically. It commanded attention to the live show being broadcasted around campus.     “Keith,” Lance called out, feeling increasingly uncomfortable about the whole ordeal. The radio station was old. And dark. And fucking creepy. Lance could feel the hint of a shudder at the top of his spine and he was just waiting for it to jump down his spine like a cat out of her skin. “Keith!” he called again. He huffed out a breath, clearing out his throat. He sucked at his teeth, a habit he took up when he was particularly agitated.

    He went behind the front desk and off to the hallway that led to the offices and the broadcast room. Upon inspection, the offices were all empty, the restrooms, too. He didn’t check the supply closets, since there was no need to. He tried to suppress thoughts of masked murderers jumping out of them, machetes and chainsaws hanging threateningly from their hands.

    Lance shook his head firmly, trying to give his boyfriend a little more faith.

    Keith wouldn’t have called him out just to go running and hiding.

    The last room, the one he barely dared to look at was the broadcasting room. The glass panel imbedded in the door showed that the lights were on and Lance could faintly hear some kind of activity happening on the other side of the door. They were live and Lance was pretty sure that he wasn’t supposed to be looking in the door as they did their jobs. But of course, being Lance, he only let that reasoning keep him back for a few seconds before he stepped up to the door.

    He found Keith. He was talking into the microphone, twisting back and forth carelessly in a net-backed chair with a frown on his face. He looked as if this was a spur of the moment type of deal, by how his hair was messy and by how exhausted he looked just sitting there. It was like he had stayed up all night just to be sitting there. Odd. Was he a guest on the show? Lance wasn’t aware they did more than play music, now.

    Lance felt something deep in his chest tug as he looked at the man behind the microphone. He didn’t know what to do. His fingers, still buried deeply into his pockets stretched out and flexed as he tried to make sense of all this.

    But then Keith happened to look up; his eyes locked with Lance’s and all was lost. Keith bit his lip, looking, for the briefest of moments, very nervous. And then he seemed to catch his resolve because he cracked a smile and waved his hand to beckon Lance into the room.

     _You sure?_ Lance mouthed to him through the glass, looking significantly at the door handle.

    Keith just nodded, mouthing _Come on in._

    So, Lance did.

    He opened the door slowly, and the sound hit Lance like a ton of bricks.

    “For you guys just tuning in, we were answering calls. This is our last one, for now.” His fingers messed with a pad in front of him. “You’re live, caller.”

    “Me? Oh. Shit, cool. Just wanted to ask if you’re back for good. Like, if so, when’s Coran’s show getting put back on? That shit was pretty rad.”

    Keith snorted. “I think you’re the first I’ve ever heard say that,” he noted. Lance edged his way through the door, avoiding tech equipment and the like. “Um… I’m fairly sure that Coran’s back in the noon to three slot. And yeah, I’m staying as long as they’ll let me.”

    “Oh, cool,” the caller said. “Well, have a good night, dude.”

    “Yeah, thanks.”

    The line went dead and Keith went on. “Like I said, I’m going to try and stay on the night shift. Got to, really.” He tossed Lance a smirk. “I heard I rocked the local insomniac community’s boat pretty badly.”

    “Oh my God,” Lance groaned aloud before he could stop himself. He clapped a hand over his mouth, eyes wide.

    Keith grinned at him. His hand signals directed Lance to one of the few chairs around Keith’s table. Lance sat down lightly, looking warily at the mic in front of him, wondering if it was on and recording.

    “In fact, I’m thinking of renaming myself _The Sandman_.”

    Lance snorted, rolling his eyes fondly.

    “But, anyway. Speaking of the local insomniac community, I’m with a certain someone.”

    Lance’s eyes widened drastically, like he knew exactly what was about to happen. And _hell no_ , he didn’t ask for this! He was no good for radio-! He couldn’t get the words, or the head-shaking down before Keith was going on. So he quietly resigned himself and prepared for death. “I’m here with my boyfriend, Lance-,” at least it would be a happy death, hearing that last bit. _Boyfriend_. It sounded mighty good from Keith’s mouth. Lance didn’t think that he had heard the title directly out of Keith’s mouth before this. “-and he had no idea I was springing this on him.”

    “I’ll say,” Lance grumped.

    Keith hummed. “Well, surprise! The radio show’s live again. And you get to be the show’s very first guest.”

    “I’m honored,” he deadpanned. He brought a hand up, rubbing it over his arm. “It’d be even better if it was warm in here,” he sighed. “Does the heater in here work? It’s friggin’ freezing.”

    Keith looked over to him. “I don’t think it’s that cold in here. Think it probably has something to do with your choice of dress? A thing tee and sweatpants?” he mused, an eyebrow quirked.

    Lance made an indignant sound. “It’s 2AM! This is a perfectly normal state of dress for the time, thanks.”

    “But you’re nowhere near your dorm,” Keith pointed out.

    “Yeah, okay. But it’s literally just right across campus. I wasn’t going to change _just_ for a little walk.” He rolled his eyes, like the idea was laughable.

    “It’s in the middle of December!”

    “And I couldn’t be bothered. Point?”

    Keith took a moment, and then he laughed. Lance’s chest was light with the feeling it gave him.

    So Lance laughed, too.

    His eyes no longer drooped with lost sleep. He felt energized, all for that smile. All for this amazing man in front of him.

    Lance could spend forever like this. And he would gladly sacrifice all of his nights for this.

    But nonetheless - they were gonna have a long talk after this.

     _The Sandman, indeed._

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed it all
> 
> The art was done by the lovely Aris! Check them out on [tumblr!](http://astro-not-art.tumblr.com) they're so freaking talented, f u c k
> 
> This was beta'd by my wonderful friend Penny! Thank you so so much, you're a goddamn gem <3
> 
> Please drop me a comment, also Aris know how fucking great their work is!
> 
> [my main tumblr](http://peanutbutterandbitter.tumblr.com) | [voltron sideblog](https://goddammitlance.tumblr.com)


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